Famous European Artists Part 13

With loving care he painted Irene of Spilimberg, who died at twenty, and whose fame in cla.s.sic learning, in music, painting, and poetry, was celebrated in sonnets and prose at her death. She was a pupil of t.i.tian, a fit representative of an age which produced among learned men such women as Vittoria Colonna and Veronica Gambara. Irene is painted "almost at full length and large as life, in a portico, from which a view is seen of a landscape, with a shepherd tending his flock, and a unicorn to indicate the lady's maiden condition. Her head is turned to the left, showing auburn hair tied with a string of pearls. Round her throat is a necklace of the same. Her waist is bound with a chain girdle, and over her bodice of red stuff a jacket of red damask silk is embroidered with gold, and fringed at the neck with a high standing muslin collar. A band hanging from the shoulders and pa.s.sing beneath one arm is held in the right hand, whilst the left is made to grasp a laurel crown, and 'Si fata tulissent' is engraved on the plinth of a pillar."

The "Epiphany," now in Madrid, was sent to Philip II., in 1560; a "Magdalen," now in the Hermitage, in 1561; "Christ in the Garden,"

"Europa and the Bull," and "Jupiter and Antiope," in 1562. t.i.tian wrote to Philip, "I had determined to take a rest for those years of my old age which it may please the majesty of G.o.d to grant me; still ... I shall devote all that is left of my life to doing reverence to your Catholic Majesty with new pictures."

"Europa," says Sweetser, "is a lovely and scantily clad maiden sitting on the back of a flower-garlanded white bull, who is swimming proudly through the green sea, throwing a line of foaming surge before his breast. In the air are flying Cupids, and the nymphs on the distant sh.o.r.e bewail the loss of their companion."

"Jupiter and Antiope," now in the Louvre, formerly called the "Venus of Pardo," is very celebrated. "Though injured by fire, travels, cleaning, and restoring," says Crowe, "the masterpiece still exhibits t.i.tian in possession of all the energy of his youth, and leads us back involuntarily to the days when he composed the Baccha.n.a.ls. The same beauties of arrangement, form, light, and shade, and some of the earlier charms of color, are here united to a new scale of effectiveness due to experience and a magic readiness of hand. Fifty years of practice were required to bring t.i.tian to this mastery. Distribution, movement, outline, modelling, atmosphere and distance, are all perfect."

The following year, 1563, t.i.tian sent to Philip "The Last Supper," with thirteen life-sized figures, upon which he had worked for six years.

When it was carried to the Escurial, in spite of the protests of the painter Navarrete, the monks cut off a large piece of the upper part of the canvas, to make it the size of the wall of the refectory!

In 1565 he painted "The Transfiguration," in the San Salvadore at Venice, the "Annunciation" for the same church; "St. James of Compostella," in the Church of San Leo, and the "Cupid and Venus" of the Borghese Palace, the Queen of Love and two Graces teaching Cupid his vocation.

"Venus is seated in front of a gorgeous red-brown drapery; her head is crowned with a diadem, and her luxuriant hair falls in heavy locks on her neck. Her arms are bare, but her tunic is bound with a sash, which meets in a cross at her bosom and winds away under the arms, whilst a flap of a blue mantle crosses the knees. With both hands she is binding the eyes of Eros leaning on her lap, whilst she turns to listen to the whispering of another Eros resting on her shoulder. A girl with naked throat and arm carries Cupid's quiver, whilst a second holds his bow.

Behind the group a sky overcast with pearly clouds lowers over a landscape of hills.... Light plays upon every part," says Crowe, "creating, as it falls, a due projection of shadow, producing all the delicacies of broken tone and a clear silvery surface full of sparkle, recalling those masterpieces of Paolo Veronese, in which the gradations are all in the cinerine as opposed to the golden key."

In 1566, the aged artist, now verging on ninety, heretofore exempt from taxation, was obliged to give a list of his property. He owned several houses, pieces of land, sawmills, and the like, and has been blamed because he did not state the full value of his possessions.

Vasari, who visited him at this time, writes,--"t.i.tian has enjoyed health and happiness unequalled, and has never received from heaven anything but favor and felicity. His house has been visited by all the princes, men of letters, and gentlemen who ever come to Venice. Besides being excellent in art, he is pleasant company, of fine deportment and agreeable manners.... t.i.tian, having decorated Venice, and, indeed, Italy and other parts of the world, with admirable pictures, deserves to be loved and studied by artists, as one who has done and is still doing works deserving of praise, which will last as long as the memory of ill.u.s.trious men."

When he was ninety-one he sent to Philip II. a "Venus," the "Martyrdom of St. Lawrence," a large "Tarquin and Lucretia," and "Philip Presenting his Son to an Angel," now in the Madrid Museum. He also painted for himself "Christ Crowned with Thorns," a powerful work, now in Munich, which Rubens, Rembrandt, and Van Dyck carefully studied as a model.

Tintoretto hung it later in his atelier, to show what a painting ought to be.

His "Adam and Eve," now at Madrid, which Rubens greatly admired and copied, was painted at this time.

In 1576, when t.i.tian was ninety-nine, he began his last picture, the "Christ of Pity," for the Franciscans of the Frari, with whom he had bargained for a grave in their chapel. The Saviour rests in death on the lap of the Virgin.

"We may suppose," says Donald G. Mitch.e.l.l, "that a vision of Lavinia--long gone out of his household--of Cecilia, still longer gone--of Violante, a memory of his young days--may have flitted on his mind as he traced the last womanly face he was to paint."

"On marble plinths at the sides of the niche are statues of Moses and the h.e.l.lespontic Sibyl, and on a scutcheon at the Sibyl's feet we see the arms of t.i.tian, a set square sable on a field argent, beneath the double eagle on a field or. A small tablet leaning against the scutcheon contains the defaced portraits of t.i.tian and his son Orazio, kneeling before a diminutive group of the 'Christ of Pity.'... It is truly surprising," says Crowe, "that a man so far advanced in years should have had the power to put together a composition so perfect in line, so elevated in thought, or so tragic in expression.... We see the traces of a brush manipulated by one whose hand never grew weary, and never learned to tremble.... In the group of the Virgin and Christ--a group full of the deepest and truest feeling--there lies a grandeur comparable in one sense with that which strikes us in the 'Pieta' of Michael Angelo. For the sublime conventionalism by which Buonarotti carries us into a preternatural atmosphere, t.i.tian subst.i.tutes a depth of pa.s.sion almost equally sublime, and the more real as it is enhanced by color."

t.i.tian did not live to complete this work, which was done by his pupil, Palma Giovine, who placed conspicuously upon it this touching inscription: "That which t.i.tian left unfinished, Palma reverently completed, and dedicated the work to G.o.d."

Age did not spoil the skill of the master. Aretino said, on looking at a portrait of a daughter of the rich Strozzio, "If I were a painter, I should die of despair.... But certain it is that t.i.tian's pencil has waited on t.i.tian's old age to perform its miracles."

Tullia said, "I hold t.i.tian to be not a painter--his creations not art, but his works to be miracles, and I think that his pigments must be composed of that wonderful herb which made Glaucus a G.o.d when he partook of it; since his portraits make upon me the impression of something divine, and, as heaven is the paradise of the soul, so G.o.d has transfused into t.i.tian's colors the paradise of our bodies."

In the summer of this year, 1576, Venice was stricken by a plague which destroyed fifty thousand people out of one hundred and ninety thousand; more than a quarter of the whole population. There was a general panic, the sick were left to die unattended, and a law was pa.s.sed that no victims of the scourge should be buried in the churches.

As the plague swept on it carried off Orazio, the son of t.i.tian, and then the idol of Venice, t.i.tian himself. He died suddenly August 27, 1576. The law of burial was quickly set aside by the supreme authorities, and, despite the fear of contagion, the canons of St. Mark bore his body in solemn procession to his grave in the Church of the Frari. In 1852, nearly three centuries later, the Emperor of Austria erected a magnificent mausoleum over his tomb. It is a vast canopy covering a statue of t.i.tian, seated, with one hand resting on the Book of Art, while the other lifts the veil of Nature. Surrounding him are figures representing painting, wood-carving, sculpture, and architecture, while on the wall behind him are bas-reliefs of three of his greatest works, the "a.s.sumption," the "Martyrdom of St. Lawrence,"

and the "Martyrdom of St. Peter." Two angels bear the simple inscription,--

"t.i.tiano Ferdinandus I. MDCCCLII."

Wonderful old man! self-made, a poet by nature, a marvel of industry, working to the very last on his beloved paintings, rich, tender to his family, true in his friends.h.i.+ps. "The greatest master of color whom the world has known."

MURILLO.

In the picturesque city of Seville, "the glory of the Spanish realms,"

the greatest painter of Spain, Bartolome Esteban Murillo, was born, probably on the last day of the year 1617. He was baptized on New Year's Day, 1618, in the Church of La Magdalena, destroyed in 1810 by the French troops under Marshal Soult.

[Ill.u.s.tration: MURILLO.]

His father, Gaspar Esteban, was a mechanic, renting a modest house which belonged to a convent, and keeping it in repair for the use of it. His mother, Maria Perez, seems to have been well connected, as her brother, Juan de Costillo, was one of the leaders of art in Seville. It is said that the family were once wealthy and distinguished, but now they were very poor.

The boy, Bartolome, was consecrated to the church, with the fond hope of his mother that he would become a priest. However, he soon exhibited such artistic talent that this project was abandoned. One day when the mother went to Church, leaving the child at home, he amused himself by taking a sacred picture, "Jesus and the Lamb," and painting his own hat on the Infant Saviour's head, and changing the lamb into a dog.

Probably the reverent mother was shocked, but she thereby gained a knowledge of the genius of her only son. In school, the boy used to make sketches on the margins of his books and on the walls.

Before he was eleven years old, both father and mother died, leaving him to the care of a surgeon, Juan Agustin Lagares, who had married his aunt, Dona Anna Murillo. Probably from this family name the boy derived his own. A little sister, Teresa, was also left an orphan.

He was soon apprenticed to his uncle, Juan del Castillo, who taught him carefully all the details of his art,--correct drawing, how to prepare canvas, mix colors, and study patiently. The lad was very industrious, eager to learn, extremely gentle and amiable, and soon attached himself to both teacher and pupils.

From this it is easy to judge that he had had a lovely mother, one who encouraged, who preserved a sweet nature in her son because sweet herself. How often have I seen a parent lose the confidence of a child by too often reproving, by over-criticism, by disparagement! Praise seldom harms anybody. We usually receive and give too little commendation all our lives.

One of my most precious memories is the fact that my widowed mother made it her life-rule not to find fault with her two children. She loved us into obedience. She told us her wishes and her hopes for us, and the smile with which she spoke lingers in my heart like an exquisite picture. Long ago I learned that no home ever had too much love in it.

For nine years the Spanish lad worked in his uncle's studio, studying nature as well as art, as shown in his inimitable "Beggar Boys" and other dwellers in the streets of Seville. When he was twenty, he painted two Madonnas, "The Virgin with St. Francis," for the Convent of Regina Angelorum, and the "Virgin del Rosario with San Domingo," for the Church of St. Thomas.

It was natural that the young artist, loving the Catholic faith, should paint as one of his first pictures the "Story of the Rosary." Mrs.

Jameson, in her "Legends of the Monastic Orders," thus gives the history of St. Dominick: "His father was of the ill.u.s.trious family of Guzman.

His mother, Joanna d'Aza, was also of n.o.ble birth.... Such was his early predilection for a life of penance that when he was only six or seven years old he would get out of his bed to lie on the cold earth. His parents sent him to study theology in the university of Valencia, and he a.s.sumed the habit of a canon of St. Augustine at a very early age.

"Many stories are related of his youthful piety, his self-inflicted austerities, and his charity. One day he met a poor woman weeping bitterly, and when he inquired the cause she told him that her only brother, her sole stay and support in the world, had been carried into captivity by the Moors. Dominick could not ransom her brother; he had given away all his money, and even sold his books, to relieve the poor; but he offered all he could,--he offered up himself to be exchanged as a slave in place of her brother. The woman, astonished at such a proposal, fell upon her knees before him. She refused his offer, but she spread the fame of the young priest far and wide....

"He united with himself several ecclesiastics, who went about barefoot in the habit of penitents, exhorting the people to conform to the Church. The inst.i.tution of the Order of St. Dominick sprang out of this a.s.sociation of preachers, but it was not united under an especial rule, nor confirmed, till some years later, by Pope Honorius, in 1216.

"It was during his sojourn in Languedoc that St. Dominick inst.i.tuted the Rosary. The use of a chaplet of beads, as a memento of the number of prayers recited, is of Eastern origin, and dates from the time of the Egyptian Anchorites. Beads were also used by the Benedictines, and are to this day in use among the Mohammedan devotees. Dominick invented a novel arrangement of the chaplet, and dedicated it to the honor and glory of the Blessed Virgin, for whom he entertained a most especial veneration. A complete rosary consists of fifteen large and one hundred and fifty small beads; the former representing the number of _Paternosters_, the latter the number of _Ave Marias_.... The rosary was received with the utmost enthusiasm, and by this single expedient Dominick did more to excite the devotion of the lower orders, especially of the women, and made more converts, than by all his orthodoxy, learning, arguments, and eloquence.

"St. Dominick, in the excess of his charity and devotion, was accustomed, while preaching in Languedoc, to scourge himself three times a day,--once for his own sins; once for the sins of others; and once for the benefit of souls in purgatory." He preached in all the princ.i.p.al cities of Europe, and died at Bologna in 1221.

In 1640, when Murillo was twenty-two, the Castilli home was broken up, the uncle Juan going to Cadiz to reside. Without fame and poor, the youth was thrown upon his own resources. There were many artists in the city of Seville, and Murillo, shy and retiring, could not expect much patronage. He decided to go to the _Feria_, a weekly market, held in front of the Church of All Saints, and there, in the midst of stalls where eatables, old clothes, and other wares were sold, he set up his open-air studio, and worked among the gypsies and the muleteers.

Rough, showy pictures were painted to order and sold to those who frequented the market-place. For two long years he lived among this humble cla.s.s, earning probably but a scanty subsistence. Here, doubtless, he learned to paint flower-girls and squalid beggars. "There was no contempt," says Sweetser, "in Murillo's feelings towards these children of nature; and his sentiments seemed to partake almost of a fraternal sympathy for them. No small portion of his popularity among the lower cla.s.ses arose from the knowledge that he was their poet and court painter, who understood and did not calumniate them. Velasquez had chosen to paint superb dukes and cardinals, and found his supporters in a handful of supercilious grandees; but Murillo ill.u.s.trated the lives of the poorest cla.s.ses on Spanish soil, and was the idol of the ma.s.ses.

With what splendor of color and mastery of design did he thus illuminate the annals of the poor! Coming forth from some dim chancel or palace-hall in which he had been working on a majestic Madonna-picture, he would sketch in, with the brush still loaded with the colors of celestial glory, the lineaments of the beggar crouching by the wall or the gypsy calmly reposing in the black shadow of the archway. Such versatility had never before been seen west of the Mediterranean, and commanded the admiration of his countrymen.

"We do not find in his pictures the beggar of Britain and America, cold, lowering, gloomy, and formidable; but the laughing child of the sunlight, full of joy and content, preferring to bask rather than to work, yet always fed somehow, and abundantly; crop-haired, brown-footed, clad in incoherent rags, but bright-eyed, given to much joviality, and with an affluence of white teeth, often shown in merry moods; not so respectable as the staid burghers of Nuremberg and Antwerp, but far more picturesque and perhaps quite as happy."

But for Murillo's life of poverty he could not have had this sympathy with the poor. Doubtless every experience is given us with a purpose, that either through the brush or the pen, or by word or deed, we may the better do our part for the elevation of mankind.

In 1642, Murillo had a new inspiration. A fellow-pupil in Castillo's school, Pedro de Moya, after joining the Spanish army and campaigning in Flanders, had spent six months in London under Van Dyck. Now he came back to Seville aglow with his delights in travel and the wonders of the Flemish painters.

Murillo was fired with ambition. He too would see famous painters and renowned cities, and become as great as his young friend Moya. But how?

He had no money and no influential friends. He would make the effort. He might stay forever at the _Feria_, and never be heard of beyond Seville.